Blog / The Business Perspective
Amplifying our Collective Voice at City Hall
October 19, 2018
by Maria S. Salinas
On Wednesday, I joined more than 150 of our members at Los Angeles City Hall for our ACCESS L.A. City Hall. An annual event, ACCESS L.A. City Hall not only gives our members an opportunity to interact with elected leaders, but also, for many it’s an introduction to how to engage with City Hall on policies and issues of importance to their businesses, economic development and quality of life.
While I have met with most members of the Council, today was my first ACCESS L.A. City Hall event since becoming President & CEO, and I took the opportunity to share my views on the important role of the Chamber in the policy making process. As the voice of business, I hope to amplify the business view on the policy matters that come before the City Council. The Chamber is a great resource to our elected officials and I encouraged an open dialogue on issues of interest to expand our region’s economy and quality of life. As the voice of business here in L.A., and a nationally influential business organization, we have the ability to amplify the collective business voice and take that message directly to City Hall.
I also shared our common goal of needing businesses to start and grow here, as well as consider L.A. an attractive option when they’re considering relocation – it’s an essential element to our continued economic growth.
For the Chamber, this was also an important opportunity to share with leaders at City Hall our priorities and goals for the coming year and discuss how we can work together to achieve those. While we work with City Council and the various City departments on a wide variety of issues throughout the year, today our Advocacy Agenda focused on the six issues we believe are most important to the vitality and economic future of the City. With that, we asked City Council to:
1. Commit to increasing housing opportunities for all
2. Prioritize business growth and job creation policies
3. Implement voter-approved measures to end homelessness
4. Support trade, travel and tourism- the economic drivers of our global city
5. Collaborate on water and energy initiatives for a sustainable city
6. Increase partnerships to ensure a quality public education system from cradle to career
In addition to these issues, we also presented our 9th Annual City Council Districts Economic Report, prepared by Beacon Economics and presented by Chris Thornberg. This report looks at economic trends by City Council Districts, highlighting annual employment, average wage, tax revenue and building permits over the last year – important information for the Council to have as they consider policies that impact their respective communities and the entire region. Beacon also presented the findings of a more deep-dive report they did on Council President Wesson's CD10.
Following our presentation, the Council members, Chris Thornberg and I had a great exchange about the opportunities for us to work more closely together, which was really the goal of today’s meeting. Councilman Wesson committed to working with us to do more detailed reports, like that done in CD10, for each of the other 14 council districts.
If we, as a business community and as a region, are going to achieve the vibrant, economically prosperous L.A. of tomorrow, we have to work together and maintain an open dialogue with our elected leaders. We must share the business view, even when it is unpopular, and we must keep our doors open to hear from them too.
It’s the only way we’ll shape our region for the benefit of all who call Los Angeles home.
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And that's The Business Perspective.
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